


leave the light on

by atlasky



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, DCU, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Cameos of the other batkids, F/M, Gen, Jason Todd can see ghosts, Please read the author's note for content warnings, Some cursewords are involved, involves time at the beach and in a library, reconnecting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-14
Updated: 2020-08-14
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:35:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25890706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/atlasky/pseuds/atlasky
Summary: When Selina Kyle signed up to be Bruce Wayne’s partner, she failed to take several things into the equation:Saying permanent goodbye to stealing from museums, wearing his tacky ring, and being surrounded by his ever growing collection of children, especially the one who can see ghosts.“Hmm,” she says. “Are you done avoiding me?”“I was never avoiding you,” Jason replies, very obviously not putting any effort in his lie that she’s a bit offended.(Or: Selina and Jason hang out for a day.)
Relationships: Selina Kyle & Jason Todd, Selina Kyle/Bruce Wayne
Comments: 7
Kudos: 227





	leave the light on

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: I was in a weird place when I wrote this. A lot has happened in real life—if most of the content of this story seems like a stream of consciousness, it’s because it probably is.
> 
> Given the current situation of the world, please pay attention to the warnings and don't hesitate to leave this story.
> 
> That being said, here are the content warnings:
> 
> Content warnings: discussions of death, the ghost of a child (non-canon character) who passed away in a car accident and all the implications around them, canon typical discussions of violence
> 
> I also took a lot of creative liberties, so. Sorry about that.
> 
> Take care, folks!

-

Rising up with the sun has been her new favorite thing.

The Wayne manor glows golden with the first light of dawn. The old floorboards creak and the eaves of the house settle with a quiet sigh. Selina dislodges the heavy arm draped across her abdomen and rolls out of bed. Bruce grunts in protest and tucks himself deeper under the blanket.

She picks up her robe from the floor and puts it on. Creeping outside of their bedroom, she walks down the long hallway, then down the stairs and into the kitchen.

The smell of pancakes greets her.

“Good morning Mrs. Kyle-Wayne,” Alfred says. He’s standing by the stove, a spatula in hand, and expertly flipping a pancake with a gentle nudge of his wrist. “Your coffee is on the table.”

“Good morning Alfred,” she replies. “Isn’t that just a handful of a name to say each time? Maybe tomorrow I’ll wake up and you’ll finally call me Selina.”

The corner of Alfred’s lips twitches. “I will not prevent you from hoping, Mrs. Kyle-Wayne.”

Selina drapes herself on her usual chair. She picks up her cup of coffee and sighs appreciatively.

It’s another lost battle, but she can’t find herself to mind it as she used to.

(“He thought I was going to die a bachelor,” Bruce said. “Let him have this one.”)

A year after they eloped to Singapore, she still finds it surprising - how Selina Kyle’s life slots together with Bruce Wayne’s. In their younger days, when they were both twenty and lost, she would have laughed and ridiculed anyone suggesting that they would end up together (as anything but a once in a while basis).

Staying still has always been harder for her, as if her life is a book and she can’t stop flipping the pages. At least not until she let him catch her wrist and ask her, properly, if she would mind slowing down with him.

She said, _I’ll screw up_.

He said, _I will too_.

Needless to say, neither of them thought a year was even a possibility.

It turns out, having known each other as long as they have, they work better when they’re on the same side. They predict how one another would react in a situation and they adjust. They fight, once in a while, because he sometimes has the emotional capacity of a brick, but there are rarely sharp edges to their words.

Scrolling on her phone and sipping her coffee, she thinks that all in all, it turns out to be one of her better decisions.

The only thing that she failed to account in the warm haze of Singapore was—

“What are we having for breakfast?”

Selina slowly puts her phone down. “Good morning, you scowly child.”

Damian scowls at her, school uniform pristine, Alfred the cat purring in his arms. “I’m not a child.”

Good morning, Selina. This is your life now.

.

All in all, his kids took in the news about their marriage with less suspicion than she had expected.

Richard, Dick, bless his heart, threw a tantrum at Bruce about the lack of invitation to their elopement, missing the point of an elopement entirely. Yet he had winked at her when he heard the news, and said sincerely, “Welcome to the family, Selina.”

At the same time, Tim offered her a fist bump, and that, followed by Steph’s high five and Duke’s laughter, gave her a reason not to respond to Dick’s too-sincere sentiment.

Her favorite, Cassandra, smiled and put a hand on Selina’s elbow, a brief touch, and then gone.

(“I see why she’s your favorite kid,” Selina told Bruce.

“I don’t have a favorite,” he denied, but that was one of the most unconvincing things he had ever said, and she told him that.)

Damian spent an entire hour looking at her with narrowed eyes. Eventually she told him that she would bring her five cats to the Manor with her, if he promised to take care of them. He brightened noticeably and looked at her with approval, even with Bruce’s low muttering about cats in the background.

Jason, though.

She has been married to Bruce for a year.

She has not seen Jason Todd in person for just as long.

-

Because it has been a year since she last saw Jason Todd without a mask, she takes a second look when she finds him standing at the street corner.

He leans against a black motorcycle with a book in hand, looking like he has nowhere else to be, and that the book he’s reading absorbs all his attention. She knows better, though. She knows his attention is focused on his surroundings. On her.

She pauses on the steps of the Wayne Foundation. To deal with the media fallout of their elopement, as a part of their PR move, Lucius insisted to have her volunteer at the Foundation. It’s better for her general impression to be seen as a reformed socialite, because that easily bores the media. She agreed, partly just to get out of the meeting room she had spent two days being stuck in. Besides, she’s good at finding hidden money, legally or not, so helping the Foundation with some administrative work is a breeze.

She studies Jason. He’s grown up tall. She remembers the boy who was sometimes a little bit angry at the world, who would still beam at her and ramble about the latest book he read, or anything he found even remotely interesting. 

She also remembers the boy who took off to a distant land and didn’t come back the same.

Selina approaches him slowly.

“Good read?” She asks, stopping in front of him, in the middle of the sidewalk. A pedestrian gives her a rude glare and steps around her. She flips the lady off.

Jason raises an eyebrow and shows her the cover of his book. _Jane Austen_. Figures. “The best.”

“Hmm,” she responds. “Are you done avoiding me?”

“I was never avoiding you,” he replies, very obviously not putting any effort in his lie that she’s a bit offended. Then he looks down to his right. “Fine,” he hisses to the empty space. “Alright. I’ll do it.”

He glances at her, then, and something in the way his lips crook makes her think twice before letting out a comment. “Selina,” he says. “Meet Ester. She’s ten and she’s always wanted to meet you.”

Here is another thing about Jason Todd: he came back from death not the teenager he once was. He also, coincidentally, is now able to see ghosts. He spends his spare time lurking around the city doing who knows what, and occasionally strikes up questionable partnerships with Constantine (this, she knows, would send Bruce into periods of deep gloom). It’s something that she’s aware his dad and siblings have gotten used to, but she herself has never encountered firsthand. She doesn’t think they are keeping quiet about it, per se, but more that they try to respect him on another thing he had no control over.

He’s watching her again. Trying to see how she would react. The inevitable disappointment he predicts will follow.

Selina prides this about herself: she never lets anyone predict her.

She bends down to Ester’s approximate height and gazes resolutely at the empty space next to Jason Todd. “Hello Ester,” she smiles. “How may I help you today?”

(She pretends not to hear the sharp intake of his breath, because this is the game that they are playing, and she’s in it to win.)

-

Ester, it turns out, is a big Catwoman fan.

Ten years old, Jason explains. A car accident. She’s been around for years and feels ready to move on. She just wants to do one last thing… so Ester spent the past week pestering Jason until he finally snapped and agreed to introduce her to Selina. 

Apparently, Ester heard through the ghost vine, or whatever it is, that Jason would be the one she could go to.

Selina stops slurping her smoothie and ignores how it had taken a ghost (a ghost!) a week of pestering before he would even talk to her. “So let me get this straight. This _one last thing_ is… meeting me?”

She would be lying if she says this entire thing is not endlessly fascinating to her, especially given how Jason had ordered a banana split and a plate of french fries, pushed the banana split in front of the seat next to him, and started picking on the fries. The ice cream melts quickly because of the summer heat, nevermind that she can hear the air conditioner whirring in the busy diner. Yet he lets the ice cream melt without sparing it a second thought.

“It’s more like, shadowing you,” he says. “Spending a day to see what you do.”

“And after that, she… crosses over?” Selina asks, making a shooing motion with her hands.

Jason wrinkles his nose, a gesture she is surprised to find she has missed the absence of without knowing. He used to do that a lot, back when her encounters with him were not only in masks, and when he would still refuse to take off his school uniform at the end of the day. “They don’t like it when you refer to it that way.”

“To what?”

“To _moving on_ as… getting rid of them, or something.” He says, suddenly inspecting a piece of fry with interest. “They’re just preparing to rest. Not disappear entirely.”

They both pause at that.

“Okay,” she says softly. “Good to know.”

He clears his throat. “Anyway, Ester would like to follow you for a day. She says she promises that she wouldn’t get in the way. Is that good with you?”

“Hmm,” she says. “And I assume that you would join us?”

His head snaps up. “No! That’s not what—,” he turns to the seemingly empty seat next to him and jabs a finger at thin air. “No, you—nope. That was never in the agreement.”

“But Jason,” Selina says, stirring her smoothie with the red straw. She likes her nails. She recently painted them purple. “How else would I have a conversation with dear Ester?”

Jason scowls. “I know what you’re doing.”

Selina also knows what she’s doing and recognizes when to take her victories. “Then it’s settled.” She grabs her purse and drops a significant amount of cash on the table. The diner needs new air conditioning and Bruce won’t miss the money. This has always been her favorite diner in the neighbourhood. “I’ll see you both tomorrow morning and we’ll have some fun.”

She smiles sweetly at the bowl of melting banana split. “Bye Ester!”

She can feel Jason’s glare on her back as she walks away—but she’s had enough practice with Bruce. His kids would get there in a few more years.

-

The next morning, she wakes up early and spends thirty minutes picking the right clothes. Bruce grumbles from the bed, annoyed at the interrupted sleep. Well, annoyed at _her_ for interrupting his sleep.

“What about this, Bruce?” She holds up a black t-shirt and a pair of green sweatpants.

Bruce grabs a pillow and covers his face with it. “What are you doing?” He asks, his voice muffled. “Please stop.”

“My darling husband,” she says, tossing the sweatpants to a pile of clothes on the armchair. “I’m going on a date.”

The asshole doesn’t even have the audacity to react to the news. “Congratulations,” he says into the pillow. “Can I sleep now?”

She rolls her eyes and turns back to her open wardrobe. It’s summer, so maybe she should wear something more cheerful. What do you wear when you hang out with kids, anyway? Alright, well, she supposes Jason is no longer a kid and the other kid is a ghost, but the point stands. “I met Jason yesterday, by the way.”

She can feel the second Bruce stills without turning around. She watches him from the mirror anyway. “Oh?” He says, slowly sitting up, every trace of sleep gone. His piercing eyes catch hers in the mirror. “How is he?”

“Well,” she says. “Invited me out to hang out. The usual.”

His brows furrow. “Did he, really?”

Bruce’s relationship with Jason is… complicated, to say the least. There was the whole thing with Jason being a bit trigger happy—completely justified, if you ask her—and Bruce being emotionally unavailable. Then there was the period when the both of them were forced to work together and navigate the years lost between them. Then there was the therapy. Now they have a standing coffee appointment, once every three months, where they just sit in silence for the necessary amount of time and not stare at each other. Depending on the weather, sometimes they make small talks.

“I haven’t hung out with him since—,” she loosely grips the sleeve of a coat with two fingers, thinking. “Before he went to Ethiopia. I promised that he would get a new library card.”

“Yes,” he says, voice quiet. “I remember.”

Then, he says, "Go with that pair of jeans you like."

She smiles, "The one with the holes on its knees? I thought you hated it with every fibre of your being."

"I don't understand it, no," Bruce admits. "It doesn't mean that I hate it. Besides, it's comfortable for you to wear."

She hates that she's easily charmed these days. It used to take him a lot more to render her speechless.

"Denim it is." Selina digs inside her wardrobe to find the said pair of jeans.

"Selina."

She looks over her shoulder to see that he’s still watching her, gaze steady and warm.

He is such a sap sometimes.

"I know, Bruce. You too,” she says, smirking. “By the way, what is the latest password for the art gallery?"

“ _Selina_.”

-

When she walks outside to the front porch, Jason is there, standing next to his motorcycle with a dark look on his face. It’s scorching hot today, but he’s wearing his trademark leather jacket and t-shirt.

“Don’t look so pleased to see me,” she says.

“I don’t have to be,” he replies. “Ester says hello. She wants to emphasize that she’s happy to see you, which I think is unnecessary, but whatever.” He yelps and glares at his right. “Did you just _pinch me_?”

She didn’t know that the ghosts could touch him.

He notices her watching. “What?”

“I didn’t know that they could touch you,” she replies simply. She walks towards him and eyes the motorcycle with distrust. “We’re not riding that.”

“Well,” he says. “You don’t have a choice.”

She raises her hand to let him see the dangling key there. “Not even if I let you drive?”

His left eyebrow twitches.

He’s impressed.

She can tell.

“ _Fine_ ,” he says, acting as if it’s the hardest thing in the world. “Give me Bruce’s BMW key.”

Jason will probably end up crashing Bruce’s favorite and most expensive car by the end of the day, but Bruce will just have to deal with it.

-

Their first stop is the beach.

Jason grumbles the entire way there. 

She opens the roof of the convertible to let the wind drown out his voice.

(She has used this technique on Bruce more than once.)

“Why would we go to the beach?” He mutters as they finally park, staring at the crowd in the distance with disdain. They can hear the sound of the waves and the bustle of the crowd who are gathering at the docks - buying food and playing arcade games.

Selina swings her legs out of the car and stretches. “Don’t be a killjoy. Ester and I want to have some fun today.” She gestures in the air. “Come on Ester, let’s go.”

She ignores Jason’s audible curse and starts walking towards the harbour. Jason drags his feet in protest, but that too, she has practice in ignoring. 

It happens to be a time in the summer when the beach is full of kids running around and other Gothamites looking for escape from the mostly cloudy city. Rows of pop-up food vendors and booths of mini games line up the docks that lead up to the sand, and then the open sea.

Selina says, “In the life of Selina Kyle, having fun in the summer is an important thing to do.”

Jason walks up to stand beside her. “When was the last time you were even _here_?”

Selina ignores him again. “You see, Ester, us thieves and other questionable people are busy during the night. That’s why you hear the phrase - _carpe diem_ , seize the daytime or whatever.”

“Oh my god,” Jason says. “Please stop.”

“What?” She raises an eyebrow. “I thought the whole point of today is to learn the ways of Selina Kyle.”

“Please stop referring to yourself as a third person,” Jason groans, burying his face in his hands. He looks down at his right. “And you—don’t believe everything she says.”

Selina claps her hands. “Well, now we should get ice cream. I know just the place.”

The ice cream shop is at the end of the harbour, a small kiosk painted in lime green and complete with a crooked sign. The last time she bought an ice cream there, an excited kid was with her, hopping on one foot while chattering excitedly about his classmates. He asked if he could get three flavors of ice cream at the same time.

She wonders if he remembers.

A glance at Jason’s face shows nothing but annoyance and boredom.

“You go ahead.”

She turns to fully face Jason. He’s looking at one of the game booths.

“What is it?” She asks.

“Ester wants a doll,” he says, and then he goes off to the balloon and dart booth, nearly elbowing a group of teenagers in the process.

She thinks—

He’s been complaining all day long, about every single thing, but he—

She follows him to the booth. The lanky man behind the booth hands Jason three darts and grins toothily. “Be careful mate, those are sharper than Batman’s batarangs.”

Jason smiles sharply. “I’m sure they are.”

He throws the three darts all at once with a flash of hands. They hit three different balloons, but the darts fall to the ground with a light thud.

All the balloons remain hanging on the wall.

The lanky man’s jaw drops open. “What—”

“I guess they’re not sharp enough,” Jason says. He reaches into his jacket and pulls out three knives. Selina whistles. “You won’t mind if I use mine, will you?”

He throws the three knives. The balloons pop.

The man stammers several incoherent phrases.

“I think we can pick a doll,” Selina says. She presses her palm on the glass counter and hops over it. She lands lightly on the other side and inspects the rows of colorful dolls—is that a green giraffe? “Which one?”

Jason turns his back on the booth and leans against the counter. “She wants the purple horse.” He puts his palm out. “My knives please.”

Selina stands on her tip toes and grabs the purple horse. She says, to the man, “Next time, don’t cheat your honest customers.”

Then she picks up the knives and hops back over the counter. She gives Jason the knives and he returns them inside his jacket. “I’ll take it that we’re done with the beach? I don’t think we’ll be welcomed anymore.”

Jason reaches for the purple horse. She lets him take it. He dangles the doll in front of him, seeing someone Selina can’t see. The corner of his lips curves up for a second, too quick to be noticed by anyone who has not spent years searching for it. “Let’s give it twenty more minutes. Since when do you care about what other people think?”

He has a point.

It’s a sunny day.

They still need to get ice cream.

And so they do.

-

Jason says nothing when she tells him that they’re going to the library.

Selina turns on the car radio and blasts Steph’s favorite pop music station.

“Ester,” Selina says. “Tell us more about yourself.”

Jason taps a single finger on the steering wheel. “She likes basketball.” He glances at the seemingly empty back seat through the rearview mirror. “And Superman.”

“Basketball and Superman. Two of my favorite things,” she replies. “Actually, I can’t say I care about basketball that much.”

“She saw you once,” Jason adds, eyes trained at the road. “You stole money from some goons who had been terrorizing the tenants of a building on Sixth avenue. Then you dumped the stash of money at a local orphanage. That’s why she likes you.”

“Hmm,” Selina says, smiling. “I remember that day.”

“I bet you do,” he replies. “You remind her of her sister.”

Selina keeps her voice even. “Where is she now?”

Jason’s listening. “She’s in nursing school,” he says. His lips twitch in amusement. “But apparently she’s in a punk-rock band in the evenings.”

“Well,” she says, tilting her head back. “She sounds cool.”

The library’s quiet and almost empty of people—the good weather is urging people to spend their day outside. Gothamites know that it won’t last long. The long, stained oak tables are nearly deserted, aside from a couple of girls giggling and shushing each other, and an old man with a fedora who is falling asleep over a stack of newspapers. The soft filtered sunlight shines on the tall shelves of hardcover books.

“What are we doing here?” Jason says flatly, and yet a little too loudly. The librarian watches them over from her desk with a warning stare. Selina waves a hand at her and gives her a solemn, trustworthy look. “Ester asked.”

She has noticed—

The increasingly too casual way he’s been holding himself, the hands in his pockets, the almost bland expression he’s now plastering on his face that wasn’t there earlier today.

Something that the bats fail to understand: the lack of expression also conveys a meaning.

“Imagine my surprise,” she says. “When I found out that Jason Todd-Wayne doesn’t have a library card.”

His eyelids flicker. “Is that so?”

The return of Jason Todd-Wayne back to life was anticlimactic, to say the least. There were a lot of press releases and forged legal documents, most of them saying that Jason was kidnapped as a child, and that everyone believed he had died in an accident abroad, not knowing he was actually alive. All grown up in his early twenties, he eventually managed to find his way back home.

The media love the story.

(Behind the scene, there were—and are—a lot more story workshops and years of therapy sessions.)

She pulls out a chair and flops her handbag down on it. “We’re getting you one.”

“I don’t want one.”

“Really— this came from the same person who once lectured me for two hours about the importance of public libraries.”

He shrugs. “I said a lot of shit before.”

“It’s good that I’m used to the bat brand of bullshit then.”

“What do you want?” Jason asks, his voice low.

“Me?” Selina widens her eyes in mock-surprise. “Nothing.”

“Cut it out,” he says. “Or I’ll leave.”

Selina slips her hand inside her handbag and draws out two tickets. Being Selina Kyle-Wayne has its perks sometimes—like scheduling-a-last-minute-reading-by-a-famous-author kind of perk.

She hands the tickets to Jason. His eyes sweep over the words incredulously. “Nina Hall, _really_? The author of the Catwoman young adult book. That Nina Hall. Aren’t you stroking your own ego too much?”

“You said Ester likes Catwoman. She’ll enjoy it.”

He’s silent for a second. Annoyed, that much she knows, and trying to come up with an argument that she won’t be able to turn back against him. _He can try_ , she thinks, pleased. She knows he won't win.

He knows it too.

Contrary to Bruce, who wears his heart on his sleeve to the point that it gets wounded until it hardens, heals, and gets wounded again, Selina almost never lets her heart peek from the armour she has spent years hiding it in.

There are, of course, a few exceptions.

She used to loathe admitting that she even has _an_ exception.

Now, though. Now.

She thinks of Damian trying to hide a smile when he sees a puppy, Steph’s box of fresh pastries she brings on Sundays, Tim’s habit of falling asleep at the dining table, Duke’s well-loved collection of comic books, Cassandra’s gentle and deadly fingers styling her hair, Dick’s warm hugs she hates to admit she likes, and—

The way she accidentally saw Jason changing the flowers by the Manor’s bay window to orchids, her favorite flowers, on her birthday last year.

It was his fault that they were not even talking in the first place.

The idiot.

It’s a good thing the person in front of her is too stubborn to admit he knows that she knows.

Suddenly, Jason lifts a hand to cover an ear. “Stop yelling,” he scolds Ester. “Yes, yes, fine, you’re excited. Enough with the rhymed song.”

Selina flashes him a fake smile.

Refusing to admit defeat, Jason says, “This still doesn’t explain why I need a library card.”

She lets her fake smile grow wider. “The event is exclusive for library card holders.”

Jason glowers.

-

One new library card later, they visit the theatre below the library. Usually used for plays and concerts, the small group of people crowding in the front of the theatre just makes it look even emptier. Selina should probably feel bad for making a famous author do a reading to such a small crowd, but, well—the book is about her, and the author gets paid a ton of (Bruce’s) money, so.

It’s not a very good book, anyway. Her teenage self was definitely not a preppy private school girl who spent her days torn up between two love interests.

After urging Ester to join the crowd, Jason leaves three seats empty in between them, scowl seemingly now permanent on his face.

The library staff welcomes everyone excitedly. Selina gives a polite wave when the audience members clap for the Wayne foundation. Jason pointedly takes out his phone and starts scrolling on it. 

The light dims and Nina Hall starts to read the first chapter of the book.

It is, admittedly, pretty boring.

Twenty minutes into the reading, Selina asks, “Can I ask you a question about Ester?”

Jason’s thumb pauses. “Sure.”

“Is she listening?”

His eyes dart forward, then back to his phone screen. “No, she’s not.”

“Hmm,” Selina says. “I know you said that she doesn’t want to see her family because she’s had closure, but, shouldn’t she?”

“No.” Jason replies. “It will just make her sad again.”

Selina stops herself from digging her fingers into the cushion of her seat. “Isn’t seeing her sister something she wants?’

“People want different things,” Jason says. His eyes are glued at his phone but his fingers have stopped moving. “She has spent enough time around to know that they will be fine and that's the important thing to her. It’s like that, sometimes. Some people don’t want to be missed as much.”

The question slips out of her lips before she can help it. “What about you?”

Jason’s face goes blank. “The show ends in forty minutes.” He shoves his phone inside the pocket of his jeans as he stands up. “I will be back then.”

She doesn’t stop him from leaving this time.

-

Breaking into the art museum is honestly a breeze.

After leaving Bruce’s car at the nearest parking garage—someone will try to steal or damage it, that’s for sure—they waltz into the museum and avoid three different sets of guards. 

Jason hasn’t said a word the entire time, except to translate Ester’s occasional excited chatter. He adds absolutely no personal comments.

Jason was even more tense during the drive. She knows that it’s her fault, but she’s like that—sharp words are molded into her flesh, and each time she thinks that she’s done with plucking them out, another one of them grows. 

It’s never been easy for her to be soft and considerate.

She’s been doing pretty decent lately, but of course she just had to trip and fall today.

Selina directs Jason and Ester to the rooftop. At night, Gotham city glows. Dim lights from the distance and bright ones from the nearby buildings.

“This view,” she decides to say. “Was the first thing I saw after I had stolen my very first painting. I’ve seen countless rooftops in countless other cities.” She dangles one hand out to feel the breeze. “I’ve even seen wonderful ones in Paris. But—,” she pauses. “Gotham is something no one can escape from, isn’t it?”

She doesn’t know why they’re here, not exactly. The library was supposed to be the last destination, yet the second she had walked out of the theatre to see Jason leaning against the wall with that same blank look, she knew that the day was not over, not yet.

Jason’s voice cuts through the peace of the night. “Ester says it’s time for her to go.”

“Oh,” Selina says, surprised, and maybe a bit awkward since this is all foreign territory to her. She’s not admitting that anytime soon. “How—”

Amusement glints on his face for a second. “She’ll disappear. Do you expect her to walk into a tunnel—or better yet, into the light?”

To preserve her dignity, she doesn’t dignify that with an answer.

Jason kneels down and lifts a fist. “Give me a bump.” A pause. “There you go. Be good and rest well.” He looks up at Selina. “Do you want to say anything?”

“Ester,” she says, smiling at the space in front of Jason. “I spent a wonderful day with you. I hope you had fun and—rest well.”

“She says thank you. She also didn’t want to say this earlier because she thought it might be rude, but she likes your old purple and black costume better.”

“Everyone’s a critique.”

“Wave now,” Jason says. “She’s disappearing.”

Selina waves until Jason stands back up.

“Is she gone?”

“Yes,” he replies. “She’s gone. The little chatterbox.”

It was a quiet ceremony and Selina wasn't even privy to half of what was going on, but it’s—sad nonetheless. The permanent loss of a kind soul. 

She has lived a pretty weird a crazy life to the point that she can't remember some important life events. This, though. This she knows she will remember.

She thinks of Bruce, suddenly, and his worried frown everytime he hears that Jason is helping another ghost. To experience this kind of sadness, over and over again.

“I wanted to be remembered.”

Selina snaps out of her thoughts. “What?”

“The answer to your question earlier. I wanted to be remembered. It’s a different thing from wanting to be missed—that one. It’s just a feeling that comes and goes.” He smiles drily. “Being remembered is something more tangible. You carry your memories with you.”

There are times when she needs to swallow her pride.

“I’m sorry about what I said,” she says. “I didn’t mean to bring it up that way.”

Jason sighs, though the tension of his shoulders loosens. She knows she’s forgiven. “Truly, it’s fine. No one ever knows the right things to say to me. If they do, I will run out of things to complain about in therapy.”

He starts to leave, turning away and walking towards the door.

“When will I see you next?” She calls after him, because she’s at this point, so she might as well try to stick the long jump.

He stops walking. "I might be out of town for a while."

She can feel her temper starting to flare. "You're back to ignoring me?"

Jason stiffens.

“I’m no longer the kid you remembered,” he says eventually with a long exhale. “This is exactly why— “

“Excuses,” she cuts. “I know you’ve changed—so what? I’ve also changed. Everyone has changed. That’s just something time does to people.”

“Not like this,” Jason says, turning around. “Not like I have. I can’t have you treating me like a kid—“

“You didn’t even give me the chance to try.”

Jason runs his hand through his hair. He’s not looking at her and it’s getting on her nerves.

“I know you. The whole time today, you’ve been trying to make up for lost time,” he says. “The beach, the library card… ? You’re trying to make a point and I don’t like what you’re trying to say.”

Selina crosses her arms. “Fine, Mr. Wise Guy. What am I trying to say? If you know me so well, tell me.”

He’s finally looking at her now. There’s a distant look in his eyes. “You’re saying that you remember me as who I was and you would rather that I—stay that way. You’d like to remember the past, but that version of me was long gone. I’m not him anymore.”

“Perhaps I just wanted to have fun with you and Ester,” she says. “Didn’t that occur to you?”

“By doing the things we did when I was—“

She throws up her hands in an exasperated gesture. “I don’t know this version of you yet.”

He scoffs. “What does that _even mean_?”

“I don’t know what you find fun _now_. You refuse to be in the same room with me for more than two minutes, unless we're both wearing masks and actively trying to stop the world from ending. How would I know what you do in your spare time?”

He gapes at her. “I—what?”

She thinks she’s made him speechless. That’s new.

“I was only working on the information that I had. You used to enjoy the beach, so I took you there. You wanted a library card, so we made one. This—,” she gestures broadly to the area around them. “Well, this one is on me. I didn’t want the day to end yet.”

“Don’t do that,” he says. He sounds tired. “Don’t make it sound like it matters to you.”

“Of course it matters to me,” she says angrily. She’s very close to throwing her shoes at him. She reaches forward to grab his shirt. The soft fabric is bunched in her fist. “How can it not? How can _you_ not matter to me?”

He lifts his hands and rests his palms on her upper arms, but he’s not pushing her away. “You shouldn’t—“

“You said you know me,” she says. “Then you know that I hate being told what to do. I’ve been waiting until you’re ready to have me back in your life, and I will keep waiting, but don’t you _dare_ tell me to stop.”

“Selina,” he says. “I’m—“

“I haven’t made it clear for you,” she says. This is all very _annoying_ . “But I was operating under your dad’s emotional manual. _Give Jason space_. Which was stupid of me, I can see that.”

She’s suddenly calmer now. She lets go of his shirt and takes a deep breath.

“Now it’s your turn to tell me, Jason. We were in each other’s lives, did everything not matter to you?”

“It did,” he replies finally. His voice shakes. “It does. It matters.”

“Okay,” she says.

That’s settled then.

She hugs him.

She may or may not be crying. “Didn’t you know that I both missed and remembered you?”

He stifles a sound that might have been laughter or a sob. He hugs her back. “I missed and remembered you too. I can’t believe you managed to con your way to the Wayne fortune after all.”

She smiles. Goodness, she hopes she hasn’t ruined her mascara too badly. “Impressive. How long have you waited to say that?”

“Give or take a year,” he says, voice muffled. “Congratulations on your wedding. I would not have attended even if you had invited me.”

They let each other go. His eyes are red. She bets hers are the same way.

“A shame,” she says. “Since all his cars are technically also mine now. I was going to give them away to selected guests, but well. It was an elopement and all that.”

They sit down next to each other on the concrete floor. She folds her legs and crosses her arms on top of them, while Jason stretches his legs widely and leans against the wall behind them. It’s just them, the night sky, and the sound of the city beneath.

“I’m not—looking for...,” he swallows, suddenly serious after a few minutes of silence. “You’re Selina to me… just. Can you stay that way?”

“Yes,” she says. She tucks her chin on top of her crossed arms. “I will make mistakes, and you will too, but you and I will be okay.”

“Alright,” he says. He lets his head thud against the wall. “I’ll take your word for it.”

They stay watching the stars until their butts feel numb, then they go and raid the Manor’s kitchen for cookies and warm chocolate milk.

He tells her that he’s enrolling in a course about historical writing. He tells her that he’s been enjoying a cooking show on Netflix lately. He tells her that sometimes it’s annoying, being able to see ghosts, because for once he would like to exercise at the park without having a ghost ask him to find their long lost treasure. The other times, cases like Ester happen, and he thinks that he would have appreciated having someone like himself around, had the position been reversed.

She pushes the plate of cookies closer to him.

She says, “Can you see the ghosts of animals?”

Jason snorts. He grabs a cookie and shoves it inside his mouth. “What—do you want me to talk to your deceased cats?”

She was telling the truth, for once.

The both of them will be okay.

-

The next morning, she kicks Bruce’s stomach for trying to wake her up too early.

Well, she tries to, because of course he catches her foot effortlessly.

“How did it go yesterday?” He asks. She was already asleep by the time he came home last night. Something about an outer space emergency. She doesn’t care as much about those emergencies, because while Bruce would rather die than admit it, Hal and the rest of Earth’s Green Lanterns are rather competent.

“Fine,” she says. “We scratched your car.”

Bruce clenches his jaw. Then, he says, not so calmly, “Selina. Which car?”

She smirks. “Guess.”

-

**End.**

-

**Author's Note:**

> Would love to hear your thoughts in a comment - thanks for reading! :)


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